Compounds of many low white buildings made of mud brick, in a vast white
shallow "bowl" pasangs wide In the distance, below, perhaps five pasangs away, in the hot, concave,
white salt bleakness, like a vast, white, shallow bowl, pasangs wide, there
were compounds, low, white buildings of mud brick, plastered. There were
many of them. They were hard to see in the distance, in the light, but I
could make them out.
"Klima," said Hamid.
Tribesmen
Warehouses and offices at Klima
Processing areas
Molding sheds Besides the mines and pits of the salt districts, there are warehouses
and offices, in which complicated records are kept, and from which
shipments to the isolated, desert storage areas are arranged. There are
also processing areas where the salt is freed of water and refined to
various degrees of quality, through a complicated system of racks and
pans, generally exposed to the sun. Slaves work at these, raking,
stirring, and sifting. There are also the molding sheds where the salt
is pressed into the large cylinders, such that they may be roped together
and eventually he laden on pack kaiila. The salt is divided into nine
qualities. Each cylinder is marked with its quality, the name of its
district, and the sign of that district's salt master.
Tribesmen
Kitchens and commissaries
Kennels and eating sheds
Discipline pits, assembly areas
Smithies and shops
Guards quarters, scribes quarters
Infirmary Needless to say, Klima contains as well, incidental to the salt industry
entered there, the ancillary supports of these mining and manufacturing
endeavors, such as its kitchens and commissaries, its kennels and eating
sheds, its discipline pits, its assembly areas, its smithies and shops,
its quarters for guards and scribes, an infirmary for them, and so many
respects Klima resembles a community, save that it differs in at least
two significant respects. It contains neither children, nor women.
Tribesmen
"We hunt the Old One," T'Zshal had said. He bad visited various pits,
some open, some sheltered, the warehouses, the refining vats. "We hunt the
Old One," he had said. And they bad followed him. Even in the shadow of
Klima's Keep itself, the squarish, stout, fortresslike building which
houses the weaponry, domicile and office of the Salt Master himself did
we recruit our crew. On the height of the keep I saw, tight in the bright,
hot wind, under the merciless sun, defiant to the pits and desert itself,
the Rag of Klima, the whip and scimitar. None bad been ordered; not
one upon the raft had, under the uplifted whip coil, nor upon the advice
of unsheathed steel, been commanded. Many were older men, sober and
mature, many blackened by the sun. Each was slave, but each came not
as a slave, but came unbidden, as a man. "We hunt the Old One," had
said T'Zshal. He said this in the pits, the warehouses, among the
refining vats. "We hunt the Old One," he said. And men had followed him.
Tribesmen
Life at the Salt Mines of Klima
Thousands live at Klima, mining for salt
Klima has its own well, but is dependent on food & goods brought in by
caravan At Klima, and other such areas, salt is an industry. Thousands serve there,
held captive by the desert. Klima has its own water, but it is dependent
on caravans for its foods. These food stores are delivered to scouted areas
some pasangs from the compounds, whence they are retrieved later by salt
slaves.
Tribesmen
The first prisoner, whose bonds had been removed, was thrust in the direction
of the compounds. He began to stagger down the slope toward the valley,
slipping in the crusts, sometimes sinking in to his knees.
One by one the prisoners were freed. None attempted to flee into the
desert. Each, as he was freed, began to trudge toward Klima. There was
nowhere else to go.
Tribesmen
In the salt districts salt is found either in solid form or in solution.
Klima, among the salt districts, is most famous for its brine pits. Salt
can be found in solid form either above or below ground. With the
subsidence of, the sea and the shifting of strata, certain cubic pasangs
of salt, in certain areas, became pressed into granite-like formations,
through which one may actually tunnel. Some of these deposits are far
below the surface of the Tahari. Men live in some of them, for weeks at
a time. In other areas, certain of these solid deposits are exposed and
are worked rather in the manner of open mining or quarries. In places
these salt mountains are more than six hundred feet high. At Klima, however,
most of the salt is in solution. It is the subterranean residue of portions
of the vanished seas themselves, which have slipped through fissures and,
protected from the heat, and fed still by the ancient seeping rivers, now
moving sluggishly beneath the surface, maintain themselves, the hidden
remnants of oceans, once mighty, which long ago swelled upon the surface
of Gor itself. The salt in solution is obtained in two ways, by drilling
and flush mining and, in the deeper pits, by sending men below to fetch
the brine. In the drilling and flush mining, two systems are used, the
doublepipe system and the separate-pipe system. In the double-pipe system
fresh water is forced into the cavity through an outer pipe and the heavier
solution of salt and water rises bubbling through the second pipe, or
inner pipe, inserted within the larger. In the separate-pipe system, two
pipes, separated by several yards, are used, fresh water being forced
through one, the salt water solution, the salt being dissolved in the
fresh water, rising through the other. The separate-pipe system is, by
most salt masters, regarded as the most
efficient. An advantage of the double-pipe system is that only a single
tap well need be drilled. Both systems require pumping, of course. But
much of the salt at Klima comes from its famous brine pits' These pits
are of two kinds, "open" and "closed." Men, in the closed pits, actually
descend and, wading, or on rafts, negotiate the sludge itself, filling
their vessels and later, eventually, pouring their contents into the lift
sacks, on hooks, worked by windlasses from the surface. The "harvesting"
vessel, not the retaining vessel, used is rather like a perforated cone
with a handle, to which is attached a rope. It is dragged through the
sludge and lifted, the free water running from the vessel, leaving within
the sludge of salt, thence to be poured into the retaining vessels, huge,
wooden tubs. The retaining vessels are then emptied later into the
lift sacks, a ring on which fits over the rope hooks. In places, the
"open pits," the brine pits are exposed on the surface, where they
are fed by springs from the underground rivers, which prevents their
dessication by evaporation, which would otherwise occur almost
immediately in the Tahari temperatures. Men do not last long in the
open pits. The same underground seepage which, in places, fills the
brine pits, in other places, passing through salt-free strata, provides
Klima with its fresh water. It has a salty taste like much of the water
of the Tahari but it is completely drinkable, not having been filtered
through the salt accumulations. It contains only the salt normal in
Tahari drinking water. The salt in the normal Tahari fresh water,
incidentally, is not without its value, for, when drunk,
it helps to some extent, though it is not in itself sufficient, to prevent
salt loss in animals and men through sweating. Salt, of course, like water,
is essential to life. Sweating is dangerous in the Tahari. This has
something to do with the normally graceful, almost languid movements
of the nomads and animals of the area. The heavy garments of the Tahari,
too, have as two of their main objectives the prevention of water loss,
and the retention of moisture on the skin, slowing water loss by evaporation.
One can permit profuse perspiration only where one has ample water
and salt.
Tribesmen
The Mining of Salt at Klima
I held the line coiled, in my left hand, it tied to the handle
on the metal, perforated cone, swinging in my right.
It was cool in the pit, on the large raft. At each corner of the raft,
mounted on a pole, was a small, oil-fed lamp. It was dark in the pit,
save for our lamps, and those of other rafts. I could see two other
rafts, illuminated in the darkness, one some two hundred yards away,
the other more than a pasang distant over the water. In places we could
see the ceiling of the pit, only a few feet above our head, in others
it was lost in the darkness, perhaps a hundred or more feet above us.
I estimated our distance beneath the surface to be some four hundred
feet. The raft, in the dark, sluggish waters, stirred beneath our feet.
I flung the cone out from the raft, into the darkness, allowing the
line to uncoil from my left hand, following the vanishing, sinking cone.
I shared the raft with eight others, three, who handled cones as I, the
"harvesters," four polemen and the steersman. Harvesters and polemen,
periodically, exchange positions. The raft is guided by a sweep at its
stern, in the keeping of the steersman. It is propelled by the polemen.
The poles used are weighted at the bottom, and are some twenty feet in
length. One of the poles, released in deep water, will stand upright in
the water, about a yard of it above the surface. The weight makes it
easier to keep the pole, which is long, submerged. It may thus be used
with less fatigue. The floor of the brine pit, in most places, is ten
to fifteen feet below the surface of the water. There are areas in the
pits, however, where the depth exceeds that of the poles. In such areas,
paddles, of which each raft is equipped with four, near the retaining
vessels, are used. It is slow, laborious work, however, moving the
heavy raft with these levers. The raft is some twelve feet in width
and some twenty-four or twenty-five feet in length. Each raft contains
a low frame, within which are placed the retaining vessels, large,
wooden salt, tubs, each approximately a yard in height and four feet
in diameter. Each raft carries four of these, either arranged in a
lateral frame, or arranged in a square frame, at the raft's center.
Ours were arranged laterally. The lateral arrangement is more convenient
in unloading; the square arrangement provides a more convenient
distribution of deck space, supplying superior crew areas at stem and
stern. From the point of view of "harvesting," the arrangements are
equivalent, save that the harvesters, naturally, to facilitate their
work, position themselves differently in the two arrangements. If one
is right-handed, one works with the retaining vessel to the left, so
that one can turn and, with the right hand, tip the harvesting vessel,
steadying it with the left band.
Tribesmen
I allowed time for the cone to sink to the bottom.
The retaining vessels are, at the salt docks, lifted from the rafts
by means of pulleys and counterweights. The crew of a given raft performs
this work. When the retaining vessels are suspended, they are tipped, and
the sludge scooped and shoveled from them into the wide-mouthed,
ring-bearing lift sacks. These, drawn and pushed on carts, fitted onto
wooden, iron-sheathed rails, are transported to the hooked lift ropes.
These ropes run in systems to the surface and return. Men at windlasses
on the surface lift the sacks, which, when emptied, return on the slack
loop. The weighted loop cannot slip back because each hook, in turn,
preceding the sack being emptied, engages one of several pintles in the
machinery, which is so geared that it can turn in only one direction.
There are twelve of those pintles, mounted in a large circle; when a
given hook drops off one, freed by gravity, another hook is already
engaged on another, held there by the weight of the ascending lift sacks.
Empty sacks are placed on slack hooks, below the machinery, to be
returned to the pit.
The steersman, when not attending to his sweep, carried a lance. We
were not alone in the pits.
Hand over hand, I drew the cone through the sludge toward the raft.
I had been amazed to learn that the brine pits, in effect a network of
small subterranean marine seas, were not devoid of life. I had expected
them to be sterile bodies of water, from the absence of sunlight,
precluding basic photosynthesis and the beginning of a food chain, and
the high salt content of the fluid. A human body, for example, will not
sink in the water. This is one of the reasons, too, it is particularly
desirable, in this environment, to weight the raft poles, to help counter
the unusual buoyancy of the saline fluid. In my original conjecture,
however, as to the sterility of these small seas, I was mistaken.
Tribesmen
The transport of Salt from the mines of Klima
Heavy (40 pound) cylinders of salt are carried by slaves to storage areas
in the desert
Cylinders are tallied, sold, and distributed to caravans and trekked out
on kaiila At Klima, and other such areas, salt is an industry. Thousands serve there,
held captive by the desert. Klima has its own water, but it is dependent
on caravans for its foods. These food stores are delivered to scouted areas
some pasangs from the compounds, whence they are retrieved later by salt
slaves. Similarly, the heavy cylinders of salt, mined and molded at Klima,
are carried on the backs of salt slaves from storage areas at Klima to
storage areas in the desert, whence they are tallied, sold and distributed
to caravans. The cylinders are standardized at ten stone, or a Gorean
"Weight," which is some forty pounds. A normal kaiila carries ten such
cylinders, five to a side. A stronger animal carries sixteen, eight to
a side. The load is balanced, always. It is difficult for an animal, or
man, of course, to carry an unbalanced load. Most salt at Klima is white,
but certain of the mines deliver red salt, red from ferrous oxide in its
composition, which is called the Red Salt of Kasra, after its port of
embarkation, at the juncture of the Upper and Lower Fayeen.
Tribesmen
The caravan kaiila, incidentally, both those which are pack animals
and those used as mounts for guards and warriors, are muchly belled.
This helps to keep the animals together, makes it easier to move in
darkness, and in a country where, often, one cannot see more than a
hundred yards to the next dune or plateau, is an important factor in
survival. If it were not for the caravan bells, the slow moving,
otherwise generally silent caravans might, unknowingly, pass within yards
of men in desperate need of succor. The kaiila of raiders, incidentally,
are never belled.
Tribesmen
The river port of Kasra is known for export of salt
Salt is brought there from Klima, placed in warehouses, and exported
by salt merchants to the rest of Gor I looked downward. Though on the map it occupied only some several feet
of the floor, in actuality it was vast. It was roughly in the shape of a
gigantic, lengthy trapezoid, with eastward leaning sides. At its
northwestern corner lay Tor, West of Tor, on the Lower Fayeen, a
sluggish, meandering tributary, like the Upper Fayeen, to the Cartius,
lay the river Port of Kasra, known for its export of salt. It was in this
port that the warehouses of Ibn Saran, salt merchant, currently the guest
of Samos of Port Kat, were to be found. This city, too, was indicated in
the cording of his agal, and in the stripes of his djellaba.
Tribesmen
"This is Ibn Saran, salt merchant of the river port of Kasra," said
Samos.
The red salt of Kasra, so called from its port of embarcation, was famed
on Gor. It was brought from secret pits and mines, actually, deep in the
interior, bound in heavy cylinders on the backs of pack kaiila.
Tribesmen
Caravans also transport salt to merchants in Tor
Salt prices are found posted publicly I went about Tor now as a traveler from Turia, a small merchant. I
checked the wallet at my side. It was intact.
Some other thieves had not done so well in the bazaar. Several
right hands, severed, were nailed to a board on which salt prices were
affixed.
Tribesmen
The salt districts (Klima is included) are administered and controlled
by the Salt Ubar
Asscess to the districts is regulated
Caravans are inspected, records of commerce are kept
Papers and credentials of merchants are checked.
Salt Merchants pay fees to the Salt Ubar A lesser protection and control of the salt, though a not
unformidable one, lies in the policing of the desert by the Salt Ubar,
or the Guard of the Dunes. The support of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar
comes from fees supplied by high salt merchants, the measure of which
fees, of course, they include in their wholesale pricings to lesser
distributors. The function of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar, thus, officially,
is to administer and control the salt districts, on behalf of the Tahari
salt merchants, primarily by regulating access to the districts, checking
the papers and credentials of merchants, inspecting caravans, keeping
records of the commerce, etc. For example, caravans between Red Rock,
and certain other oases, and the salt districts, will travel under an
escort of the Guard of the Dunes. Many salt caravans, incidentally,
travel only between the districts and the local oases, while others
travel between the local oases and the distant points, often culminating
with Kasra or Tor.
Tribesmen
These high salt merchants run their own caravans back and forth from Klima
Salt is brought to distribution points (Kasra, Tor) to be sold wholesale to
other merchants who distribute the salt in other parts of Gor The support of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar
comes from fees supplied by high salt merchants, the measure of which
fees, of course, they include in their wholesale pricings to lesser
distributors.
Tribesmen
We knew, generally, Red Rock, the kasbah of the Salt Ubar and such, lay
northwest of Klima, but, unless one knows the exact direction, the trails,
this information is largely useless. Even in a march of a day one could
pass, unknowingly, an oasis in the desert, wandering past it, missing
it by as little as two or three pasangs.
Knowledge of the trails is vital.
None at Klima knew the trails. The free, their masters, had seen to
this.
Moreover, to protect the secrecy of the salt districts, the trails
to them were not openly or publicly marked. This was a precaution to
maintain the salt monopolies of the Tahari, as though the desert itself
would not have been sufficient in this respect.
T'Zshal smiled, seeming human for the moment, and not kennel master.
"None, my pretties," said he, "knows the way from Klima. There is thus,
in the desert, no way from Klima."
Tribesmen
"We are slaves of the salt, slaves of the desert," he said. "We return
to Klima."
"The Salt Ubar is gone," I said.
"We will negotiate with local pashas and regulate the desert, and
discuss the prices of the varieties of salt," said T`Zshal.
"The price of salt will soon rise," I suggested.
"It is not impossible," said T`Zshal.
I wondered if it were wise to have armed the men of Klima and put them
in the saddles of kaiila. They were not typical men. There was none there
who had not survived the march to Klima.
"Should you ever need aid," said T`Zshal, "send word to Klima. The slaves
of the salt will ride."
"My thanks," I said. They would be fierce allies. They were desperate and
mighty men. Each there had made the march to Klima.
"Things now," I said, "I conjecture, will change at Klima." I recalled
that Hassan had warned me against taking a bit of silk, perfumed, into
Klima. I had hidden it in the crusts. "Men would kill you for it," he
said.
T`Zshal looked about himself. Slave girls, in coffle, shrank back.
"We will need taverns, cafes, at Klima," he said. "The men have been too
long without recreation."
"With control of much salt," I said, "you may have much what you wish."
"We shall confederate the salt districts," said T`Zshal.
"You are indeed ambitious," I said. T'Zshal, I saw, was a leader.
Haroun, sitting in court, in what had been the audience room of the kasbah
of Ibn Saran, had invited T'Zshal, and his lances, to join his service.
T`Zshal and the others had refused. "We will return to Klima, said he,
"Master." T'Zshal, I knew, would serve under no man. "I would rather be
first at Klima than second in Tor," he had said. He was a slave, true,
but of no man, only of the salt, and the desert.
Tribesmen
We took a salt wagon, empty, to Tor from Kurtzal.
Tribesmen
I stood aside as a chain of male slaves was herded by, with spear butts.
They were bound for the brine pits of the Tahari, whence comes most of the
caravan salt. I expected that less than half of them would reach the pits.
Heavy collars, with rings, they wore about their necks. A heavy chain,
running through the rings, linked them together by the throat.
Tribesmen
Ibn Saran, it seemed to me, exercised more influence at the oasis of
Nine Wells than one might have expected of a mere merchant of salt. I
had seen men withdrawing from the path of his kaiila, standing aside,
lifting their hands to him.
Tribesmen
The judge, on the testimony of Ibn Saran, and that of two white-skinned,
female slaves, one named Zaya, a red-haired girl, the other a dark-haired
girl, whose name was Vella, had sentenced me as a criminal, a would-be
assassin, to the secret brine pits of Klima, deep in the dune country,
there to dig until the salt, the sun, the slave masters, had finished
with me. From the secret pits of Klima, it was said, no slave had ever
returned. Kaiila are not permitted at Klima, even to the guards.
Supplies are brought in, and salt carried away, by caravan, on which the
pits must depend. Other than the well at Klima, there is no other water
within a thousand pasangs. The desert is the wall at Klima. The locations
of the pits, such as those at Klima, are little known, and, to protect
the resource, are kept secret by mine agents and merchants. Women are not
permitted at Klima, lest men kill one another for them.
Tribesmen
"Do you understand what it is," asked Ibn Saran, "to be sent to
Klima--to be a salt slave?"
"I think so," I told him.
"There is the march to Klima." said he, "through the dune country,
on foot, chained, on which many die."
I said nothing.
"And should you be so unfortunate," said he, "to reach the vicinity
of Klima, your feet must he bound with leather to your knees, for you will
sink through the salt crusts to your knees, and, unprotected, your flesh,
by the millions of tiny, heated crystals, would be grated and burned from
your bones."
I looked away, in the chains.
"In the pits," he said, "you pump water through underground deposits,
to wash salt, with the water, to the surface, and repump again the same
water. Men die at the pumps, in the heat. Others, the carriers, in the
brine, must fill their yoke buckets with the erupted sludge, and carry it
from the pits to the drying tables; others must gather the salt and mold
it into cylinders." He smiled. "Sometimes men kill one another for the
lighter assignments."
I did not look at him.
Tribesmen
None, it seemed, at Red Rock had either seen, or heard, of so strange an
architectural oddity as a tower of steel in the desert.
This was irritating to Hassan, and did not much please me either, for the
oasis of the Battle of Red Rock was the last of the major oases of the
Tahari for more than two thousand pasangs eastward; it lay, in effect,
on the borders of the dreaded dune country; there are oases in the dune
country but they are small and infrequent, and often lie more than two
hundred pasangs apart; in the sands they are not always easy to find:
among the dunes one can, unknowingly, pass within ten pasangs of an oasis,
missing it entirely. Little but salt caravans ply the dune country.
Caravans with goods tend to travel the western. Or distant eastern edge
of the Tahari; caravans do, it might be mentioned, occasionally travel
from Tor or Kasra to Turmas, a Turian outpost and kasbah, in the
southeastern edge of the Tahari, but even these commonly avoid the
dune country, either moving south, then east, or east, then south,
skirting the sands. Few men, without good reason, enter the dune country.
Tribesmen
Tor, lying at the northwest corner of the Tahari, is the principal
supplying point for the scattered oasis communities of that dry vastness,
almost a continent of rock, and heat, and wind and sand. These communities,
sometimes quite large, numbering in hundreds, sometimes thousands of
citizens depending on the water available, are often hundreds of pasangs
apart. They depend on caravans, usually from Tor, sometimes from Kasra,
sometimes even from far Turia, to supply many of their needs. In turn,
of course, caravans export the products of the oases. To the oases
caravans bring various goods, for example, rep-cloth, embroidered cloths,
silks, rugs, silver, gold, jewelries, mirrors, kailiauk tusk, perfumes,
hides, skins, feathers, precious woods, tools, needles, worked leather
goods, salt, nuts and spices, jungle birds, prized as pets, weapons,
rough woods, sheets of tin and copper, the tea of Bazi, wool from the
bounding Hurt, decorated, beaded whips, female slaves, and many other
forms of merchandise.
Tribesmen
Much of the city, of course, was organized to support the caravan trade.
There were many walled, guarded warehouses, requiring their staffs of
scribes and guards, and, in hundreds of hovels, lived kaiila tenders,
drovers, and such, who would, at the caravan tables, when their moneys
had been exhausted, apply, if accepted, making their mark on the roster,
once more for a post with some new caravan. Guards for these caravans,
incidentally, were usually known by, and retained by, caravan merchants
between caravans. They were known men. Tenders and drovers, on the whole
, came and went. Elaborate random selection devices, utilizing coins and
sticks, and formulas, were sometimes used by merchants to assure that
applying tenders and drovers were selected, if they were not known, by
chance. Tenders and drovers were assured that this was to insure fairness.
Actually, of course, as was well known, this was a precaution against the
danger of hiring, en bloc, unwittingly, an organized group of men, who
might, prior to their hiring, have formed a plan to slay the guards and
merchants and make off with the caravan. Tenders and drovers, however,
like men generally, were an honest sort. When they returned to Tor, of
course, they had been long in the desert. At the end of the trip they
received their wages. Sometimes, not even a hundred yards from the
warehouses, these men would be met by enterprising cafe owners, praising
the advantages of their respective establishments. The owners of these
cafes, usually, would bring with them a chain of their girls, stripped,
as free women in the Tahari districts may not be, purportedly a typical
selection of the stock available.
Tribesmen
The location of his kasbah is secret. Probably, other than his own
men, only some few hundred know of it, primarily merchants high in the
salt trade, and few of them would know its exact location. Whereas salt
may be obtained from sea water and by burning seaweed, as is sometimes
done in Torvaldsland, and there are various districts on Gor where salt,
solid or in solution, may be obtained, by far the most extensive and
richest of known Gor's salt deposits are to be found concentrated in the
Tahari. Tahari salt accounts, in its varieties, I would suspect, for
some twenty percent of the salt and salt-related products, such as
medicines and antiseptics, preservatives, cleansers, bleaches, bottle
glass, which contains soda ash, taken from salt, and tanning chemicals,
used on known Gor. Salt is a trading commodity par excellence. There
are areas on Gor where salt serves as a currency, being weighed and
exchanged much as precious metals. The major protection and control
of the Tahari salt, of course, lies in its remoteness, the salt districts,
of which there are several, being scattered and isolated in the midst of
the dune country, in the long caravan journeys required, and the difficulty
or impossibility of obtaining it without knowing the trails, the ways of
the desert. A lesser protection and control of the salt, though a not
unformidable one, lies in the policing of the desert by the Salt Ubar,
or the Guard of the Dunes. The support of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar
comes from fees supplied by high salt merchants, the measure of which
fees, of course, they include in their wholesale pricings to lesser
distributors. The function of the kasbah of the Salt Ubar, thus, officially,
is to administer and control the salt districts, on behalf of the Tahari
salt merchants, primarily by regulating access to the districts, checking
the papers and credentials of merchants, inspecting caravans, keeping
records of the commerce, etc. For example, caravans between Red Rock,
and certain other oases, and the salt districts, will travel under an
escort of the Guard of the Dunes. Many salt caravans, incidentally,
travel only between the districts and the local oases, while others
travel between the local oases and the distant points, often culminating
with Kasra or Tor. Some caravans, of course, journey through from the
distant points to the salt districts, accepting the danger and inconvenience
of trekking the dune country, but thereby avoiding the higher charges of
picking up salt from the storehouses in the local oases. Even these
caravans, of course, once in the dune country are accompanied by the
men of the Guard of the Dunes. The Guard of the Dunes, however, does
not obtain the title of the Salt Ubar in virtue of his complacent
magistracy of the salt districts, subservient to the
Tahari merchants. There are those who say, and I do not doubt it true,
that it is he, and not the merchants, who controls the salt of the Tahari.
Nominally a sheriff of the Tahad merchants, he, ensconced in his kasbah,
first among fierce warriors, elusive and unscrupulous, possesses a
strangle bold on the salt of the Tahari, the vital commerce being ruled
and regulated as he wills. He holds within his territories the right of
law and execution. In the dunes he is Ubar and the merchants bow their
heads to him. The Guard of the Dunes is one of the most dreaded and
powerful men in the Tahari.
Tribesmen
The salt mines of Klima on Gor
